From: https://youtube.com/watch?v=JCiVBvptZyk

Context: Throughout this transcript, Bhante Vimalaramsi is the speaker unless otherwise indicated.

[Music]

welcome i'd like to

give you the loving kindness

instructions for the beginner's

meditation practice

i want to start off by saying that this

practice is a feeling meditation

while you might be using verbalizations

like may i be happy may i be content may

i be at peace

and so on

that's more than enough to get your

feeling started and what i mean by that

is you're not going to be saying those

words over and over and over again like

a

mantra meditation

this verbalization just helps you to

stay with that feeling you say it one

time or two times

and then when you get that experience of

the feeling in your chest

in the center of your heart

there's this

warm fuzzy glowing feeling that you'll

get

and that's really loving kindness

it can help to think about something

that makes you happy

like holding a baby in your arms or

holding a puppy or a kitten in your arms

or whatever makes you happy you might

even think about a wholesome

memory that you had as a kid or whatever

works for you

as soon as you feel

that warm glow that is loving kindness

you maintain it by just keeping your

attention there you don't need to push

it

you don't need to

try to do anything with it or control it

just stay with it keep your attention on

it and just rest in that

and the second uh point that i want to

make here that's actually very crucial

is you'll see me this little guy here

he's

he's smiling

and he's not smiling for any any uh

reason in particular but

it's a good teaching for us to be able

to do that in our meditation

you'll see that in a lot of the buddhist

iconography of the buddha

whether it's pictures or statues he has

a little buddha smile he has a little

smile and that's a teaching

for us to do that in our practice

now while you're smiling with your lips

you're also having a little smile in the

mind in your eyes

and in the heart and that's just

basically means

you're content and you're relaxed and

everything is fine

you're letting go of all kinds of

thoughts about the outside world

you know you can put aside whatever you

have to do for about 30 minutes this is

a vacation time for you for the next 30

minutes you're just

going to be here with loving kindness

now once you have that feeling that warm

fuzzy glowing feeling in the in the

center of your chest

you

send that to yourself so just keep

feeling that for the first 10 minutes

and after

after that 10 minutes has elapsed

you send it out to a spiritual friend

now the spiritual friend if somebody is

somebody of the same sex

they're alive

and they're not a family member

you'll be dealing with family members at

a later stage in the practice but for

the time being they're just a friend

somebody that you know personally

somebody that uh well it could be even

you know somebody like the dalai lama

but working with somebody who is a

spiritual friend that's personal to you

is much more effective so you think

about somebody that puts a smile on your

face

that would be a perfect candidate for a

spiritual friend as long as they're of

the same sex

as long as they're not a family member

and as long as they're alive

so now that you have this feeling of

loving kindness in your chest

you can imagine them being in front of

you the spiritual friend and that you're

sending it out to them you can imagine

them smiling and receiving that loving

kindness

or you can just put them in the middle

of that feeling in your heart and just

allow them to be

basking in that glow of loving kindness

and it's a it's that simple that's

really this beginning practice is you're

staying with your spiritual friend that

loving kindness is your object of

meditation

now while that sounds very simple it's

easier said than done when you have

distractions

and these distractions come in the form

of different kinds of hindrances

and whatever the hindrance might be

it is a hindrance that might

arise in the way of some kind of sensual

craving you might hear something outside

and your mind starts to deviate its

attention towards that

or it might irritate you and that's a

sense of aversion that's ill will

or you might feel restless or you might

feel slot and torpor or you might have

some doubts you know in the form of am i

doing this right

you know am i doing the loving kindness

meditation correctly am i radiating

correctly to my spiritual friend

all of those thoughts you can just let

go of

and there is a very special and very

important way in the way you let go of

these hindrances

and this is the process of the six r's

the six r's are number one recognize

number two release

number three relax

number four re-smile

number five return and number six repeat

now if there are thoughts in the

background if certain kinds of thoughts

are there but your mind is

attentive

to its loving-kindness to the object of

lovingkindness and the spiritual friend

then you don't need to do the 6rs those

background thoughts will fade away on

their own because they no longer have

the feel of your attention

but as soon as let's say this is your

object this here is your object and this

is the mind resting on it

as soon as it goes away like this that

means now the attention is no longer

resting here but is thinking about

something else that's fine

don't beat yourself about don't beat

yourself up for it

just understand that in that moment the

truth of the moment is the mind is

distracted so don't try to fight it

don't try to push it don't try to do

anything with it

there's another statement called drops

that is don't resist or push soften and

smile

and this is already

within this process of the six hours and

i'll explain that now

now let's say that the mind becomes

distracted and its attention is deviated

from loving-kindness and it's somewhere

else

when you notice that and you realize

that you're distracted you're already

using

the first r which is recognized

now you take away your attention from

that hindrance and you intend to relax

the mind and body

so you're doing the releasing of the

attention from there

and you're doing the relaxed step

now the relaxed step is what sets this

meditation apart from any other practice

the reason is because

the tightness and tension you feel from

that distraction from the mind that is

filled with the hindrance

is a mind that's manifesting craving

that tightness and tension is craving

when you relax that tightness and

tension you are abandoning you are

letting go you are relinquishing

that craving

and you will immediately notice that

when you do that and how do you know

you're relaxing well one of the ways you

know is when you're tightening your fist

and you let go it's relaxed

and so in the same way you feel the

tension you realize there's tension and

you let it go

and you feel this open mind this mind

that is

spacious this mind that's like a

cloudless blue sky

and when you have that clarity of mind

you we smile

the reason you're re-smiling is bringing

is because you're bringing up a

wholesome object again

that smile anchors you to the feeling of

loving kindness

so when you smile you are re-sharpening

your mindfulness

you are recollecting the mind meaning

you're collecting its attention back

and that's when you do the return step

you come back to the feeling of loving

kindness

and you stay with the object of

meditation

now if you get distracted again you use

repeat you do it over again

there might be a time where the

hindrance you let go and it comes back

again no big deal

it'll come back again but it will be

weaker the next time around so you do

the same process

might come back again but it will be

even weaker this time around and

eventually it will fade away every time

you do the six hours whenever your

mind's attention

moves away from its object of meditation

so this is the practice in a nutshell

once you experience certain kinds of

phenomena in the body which is to say

you start losing feeling in the body

you start feeling more equanimous so

you'll go through a series of different

things you'll start feeling first

greater joy

you'll feel elation you'll feel all

kinds of things

eventually that joy will kind of taper

off and it will be more relaxed and calm

and eventually the feeling of loving

kindness will feel like it's in the head

and you lose any kind of feeling in the

body

if something lands on your skin you'll

feel it but otherwise you're just having

your attention on the head

and the loving kindness will have moved

there

when that happens

that's when you will do the next set of

instructions

bye

[Music]

welcome i'd like to

give you the loving kindness

instructions for the beginner's

meditation practice

i want to start off by saying that this

practice is a feeling meditation

while you might be using verbalizations

like may i be happy may i be content may

i be at peace

and so on

that's more than enough to get your

feeling started and what i mean by that

is you're not going to be saying those

words over and over and over again like

a

mantra meditation

this verbalization just helps you to

stay with that feeling you say it one

time or two times

and then when you get that experience of

the feeling in your chest

in the center of your heart

there's this

warm fuzzy glowing feeling that you'll

get

and that's really loving kindness

it can help to think about something

that makes you happy

like holding a baby in your arms or

holding a puppy or a kitten in your arms

or whatever makes you happy you might

even think about a wholesome

memory that you had as a kid or whatever

works for you

as soon as you feel

that warm glow that is loving kindness

you maintain it by just keeping your

attention there you don't need to push

it

you don't need to

try to do anything with it or control it

just stay with it keep your attention on

it and just rest in that

and the second uh point that i want to

make here that's actually very crucial

is you'll see me this little guy here

he's

he's smiling

and he's not smiling for any any uh

reason in particular but

it's a good teaching for us to be able

to do that in our meditation

you'll see that in a lot of the buddhist

iconography of the buddha

whether it's pictures or statues he has

a little buddha smile he has a little

smile and that's a teaching

for us to do that in our practice

now while you're smiling with your lips

you're also having a little smile in the

mind in your eyes

and in the heart and that's just

basically means

you're content and you're relaxed and

everything is fine

you're letting go of all kinds of

thoughts about the outside world

you know you can put aside whatever you

have to do for about 30 minutes this is

a vacation time for you for the next 30

minutes you're just

going to be here with loving kindness

now once you have that feeling that warm

fuzzy glowing feeling in the in the

center of your chest

you

send that to yourself so just keep

feeling that for the first 10 minutes

and after

after that 10 minutes has elapsed

you send it out to a spiritual friend

now the spiritual friend if somebody is

somebody of the same sex

they're alive

and they're not a family member

you'll be dealing with family members at

a later stage in the practice but for

the time being they're just a friend

somebody that you know personally

somebody that uh well it could be even

you know somebody like the dalai lama

but working with somebody who is a

spiritual friend that's personal to you

is much more effective so you think

about somebody that puts a smile on your

face

that would be a perfect candidate for a

spiritual friend as long as they're of

the same sex

as long as they're not a family member

and as long as they're alive

so now that you have this feeling of

loving kindness in your chest

you can imagine them being in front of

you the spiritual friend and that you're

sending it out to them you can imagine

them smiling and receiving that loving

kindness

or you can just put them in the middle

of that feeling in your heart and just

allow them to be

basking in that glow of loving kindness

and it's a it's that simple that's

really this beginning practice is you're

staying with your spiritual friend that

loving kindness is your object of

meditation

now while that sounds very simple it's

easier said than done when you have

distractions

and these distractions come in the form

of different kinds of hindrances

and whatever the hindrance might be

it is a hindrance that might

arise in the way of some kind of sensual

craving you might hear something outside

and your mind starts to deviate its

attention towards that

or it might irritate you and that's a

sense of aversion that's ill will

or you might feel restless or you might

feel slot and torpor or you might have

some doubts you know in the form of am i

doing this right

you know am i doing the loving kindness

meditation correctly am i radiating

correctly to my spiritual friend

all of those thoughts you can just let

go of

and there is a very special and very

important way in the way you let go of

these hindrances

and this is the process of the six r's

the six r's are number one recognize

number two release

number three relax

number four re-smile

number five return and number six repeat

now if there are thoughts in the

background if certain kinds of thoughts

are there but your mind is

attentive

to its loving-kindness to the object of

lovingkindness and the spiritual friend

then you don't need to do the 6rs those

background thoughts will fade away on

their own because they no longer have

the feel of your attention

but as soon as let's say this is your

object this here is your object and this

is the mind resting on it

as soon as it goes away like this that

means now the attention is no longer

resting here but is thinking about

something else that's fine

don't beat yourself about don't beat

yourself up for it

just understand that in that moment the

truth of the moment is the mind is

distracted so don't try to fight it

don't try to push it don't try to do

anything with it

there's another statement called drops

that is don't resist or push soften and

smile

and this is already

within this process of the six hours and

i'll explain that now

now let's say that the mind becomes

distracted and its attention is deviated

from loving-kindness and it's somewhere

else

when you notice that and you realize

that you're distracted you're already

using

the first r which is recognized

now you take away your attention from

that hindrance and you intend to relax

the mind and body

so you're doing the releasing of the

attention from there

and you're doing the relaxed step

now the relaxed step is what sets this

meditation apart from any other practice

the reason is because

the tightness and tension you feel from

that distraction from the mind that is

filled with the hindrance

is a mind that's manifesting craving

that tightness and tension is craving

when you relax that tightness and

tension you are abandoning you are

letting go you are relinquishing

that craving

and you will immediately notice that

when you do that and how do you know

you're relaxing well one of the ways you

know is when you're tightening your fist

and you let go it's relaxed

and so in the same way you feel the

tension you realize there's tension and

you let it go

and you feel this open mind this mind

that is

spacious this mind that's like a

cloudless blue sky

and when you have that clarity of mind

you we smile

the reason you're re-smiling is bringing

is because you're bringing up a

wholesome object again

that smile anchors you to the feeling of

loving kindness

so when you smile you are re-sharpening

your mindfulness

you are recollecting the mind meaning

you're collecting its attention back

and that's when you do the return step

you come back to the feeling of loving

kindness

and you stay with the object of

meditation

now if you get distracted again you use

repeat you do it over again

there might be a time where the

hindrance you let go and it comes back

again no big deal

it'll come back again but it will be

weaker the next time around so you do

the same process

might come back again but it will be

even weaker this time around and

eventually it will fade away every time

you do the six hours whenever your

mind's attention

moves away from its object of meditation

so this is the practice in a nutshell

once you experience certain kinds of

phenomena in the body which is to say

you start losing feeling in the body

you start feeling more equanimous so

you'll go through a series of different

things you'll start feeling first

greater joy

you'll feel elation you'll feel all

kinds of things

eventually that joy will kind of taper

off and it will be more relaxed and calm

and eventually the feeling of loving

kindness will feel like it's in the head

and you lose any kind of feeling in the

body

if something lands on your skin you'll

feel it but otherwise you're just having

your attention on the head

and the loving kindness will have moved

there

when that happens

that's when you will do the next set of

instructions

bye